The Mobile Frontier

About this blog

The computing industry is undergoing major evolution positioning mobile devices as the primary personal computing device. This blog will identify concepts and observations related to that evolution - missives on the journey to a mobile computing world.

Tags

This blog post is contributed by Murali Krishna, Team Lead for Java-J2ee mobility.
Have you ever needed to show a screen from your Android device on a desktop? I recently faced a client scenario in my role as an IBM application developer in which I needed to do just that. I needed to show my progress on a particular development project to members of the client team who were at a remote location so that they could suggest any needed changes. The best way to achieve this was by sharing a mobile device screen onto my desktop (I... [More]

Companies use IBM UrbanCode Deploy to achieve automated deployment at scale for web, distributed and now mobile apps alike. While this kind of DevOps practice may be starting in your company, if you’re the mobile team, you may not realize how it can help you too.
As I visit with IBM clients, I’m thrilled to see the practice of continuous integration (CI) used consistently by teams to automate building mobile apps. In the beginning, the CI solution often involves Git and Jenkins, and why not? With Jenkins... [More]

This blog post is contributed by Murali Krishna who works with the S&D department. He is a BTech graduate by qualification and started his career with Java J2EE development.
The back story
I am an application developer for IBM, and I was recently working on a native application in iOS for one of our clients in which the camera takes a picture of an object and sends it to the server. Then the server performs a comparison with the predefined list of images already placed on the server and returns the matching... [More]

** UPDATED SESSIONS in November/December 2014 ** With the popularity of this blog entry, if there's interest (please leave a comment), we can revisit this study group on Bluemix. However, before you comment, please watch this excellent 10 minute MQA Bluemix video from our User Education team - a rapid tour through all of the topics below and then comment to let me know if you're interested in a weekly study group!
Want to learn more with our Subject Matter... [More]

This blog post contributed by Markus Van Kempen, a Canadian SAP Mobile leader.
Integrating SAP with different systems, websites or mobile applications has become necessary, and the good news is that it has also become more simple. Formerly, connectors and programming languages were more proprietary, but in the last couple of years SAP has opened its enterprise resource planning (ERP) system and adopted more standard technologies to enable easier integration. In this post, I’d like to show one example of how you can extract... [More]

This blog post is contributed by Kleber Rodrigo de Carvalho, a software engineer for IBM Brazil and IBM Redbooks Thought Leader for mobile .
Do you want to develop hybrid applications but don't know where to learn about it? Are you trying to understand the difference between Apache Cordova and PhoneGap? Or perhaps you wonder where you can get started with IBM Worklight? In this blog post I hope to help answer these questions.
What's the difference between Cordova and PhoneGap?
Apache Cordova is an open source... [More]

This blog post is contributed by Nguyen Van Duy, an IBM Associate Certified IT Architect with GTS Vietnam, working for GBS Innovation Center as the development team leader in Vietnam .
The Internet is no longer a global network just for computers but is becoming an environment for diverse devices to join. Preluded by mobile, billions of smart devices are instrumenting our world today. They are controllers, sensors, meters, gauges, switches, scanners, radio frequency identification (RFID) and supervisory control and data... [More]

This blog post is contributed by Nick Gibson, an analytics developer for IBM Passes.
We’re always excited to play with the hottest features from each new version of iOS, but the recent rollout of iOS 8 is especially important to us given this year’s announcement of a new IBM-Apple partnership focused on the mobile enterprise. Swift —Apple’s new programming language—is arguably one of the most interesting features in iOS 8, and people are already starting to ask questions about how to use the Mobile... [More]

This blog post is contributed by Nathan Hazout, a developer for the web and for mobile who does customer oriented R&D for IBM Worklight.
Google Chromecast is an implementation of Google Cast , “a technology that enables multi-screen experiences and lets a user send and control content like video from a small computing device like a phone, tablet, or laptop to a large display device like a television.”
Google provides native APIs (Android and iOS) to allow your application to send media to a Chromecast dongle.... [More]

This blog post is contributed by Richard Gamblin, a Software Architect who advises organizations on the application of Mobile, WebSphere and System z technologies.
When it comes to transforming the face of business through consumer engagement, mobile is the hot topic on every chief marketing officer’s lips. The frustration at having to wait for new ideas to be delivered is now fading given the pace at which technology can turn concept into reality. I don’t mean simply converting a web page into a mobile app. I’m... [More]

This blog post is contributed by Justin Ndreu, a Senior IT Architect for IBM within IBM Global Technology Services.
So you want to become a mobile enterprise and support a bring your own device (BYOD) program for your mobile users? Should you hop on board the mobile device management (MDM) bandwagon? What about those new identity-based network services the big wireless network (WLAN) vendors have recently brought to market? Which one should you choose? Actually, you need both. Here's why:
MDM
Mobile... [More]

This blog post is contributed by Bryan Boyd, a solutions software engineer for IBM MessageSight.
"How am I going to find you in the crowd?"
Running a marathon requires support—lots of it. You need energy gels, sports drink and, most important, encouragement. Two days before my first marathon last February, I was trying to explain to my wife exactly when and where to meet me on the marathon course to provide support. As she asked the question above, I realized that "I'll be passing mile 17 sometime... [More]

This blog post is contributed by Dr. Thomas Hesse who focuses on Web Applications, Enterprise Architecture Integration, IBM Worklight and mobile payments with IBM.
In a recent blog post I presented an IBM demo project for mobile customer relationship management (CRM), accessing a Siebel-based CRM system on a mobile device using an app developed with IBM Worklight . Today I am going to describe some details on the app’s architecture and the tools used to build it.
Hybrid architecture
The app is... [More]

This blog post contributed by John Samuel who focuses on the Internet of Things and M2M with IBM.
Well I don’t mean actually speak to you—that would be freaky. Imagine you’re driving along and the car starts speaking—that would put me off from driving slightly!
So what do I mean when I say “communicate with you”? You might be surprised to know that cars have a huge amount of data within them, but they do. Even if your car is 10 years old it probably has a fair amount of data. But when... [More]

This blog post is contributed by Srihari Kulkarni, a Senior Staff Software Engineer on the IBM Worklight team .
Let me begin with a no-brainer: Do you think that enterprise mobile apps must be secure? The answer, without batting an eyelid, is yes. So, what are the challenges in securing mobile apps? Are they different from other enterprise software? If yes, are the solutions different?
If you’re looking for answers to the above questions and more, you’ve come to the right place. In this post, I will provide a... [More]

This blog post is contributed by Mark Gargan, a technical lead for the newly formed Mobile Center of Competency team for Industry Solutions.
IBM Worklight allows you to create reusable cross-platform solutions that can run the full range of form factors. However, the sheer number of variations of mobile device form factors can lead to a maintenance nightmare. How can we minimize the need to code for all form factors?
Responsive web design (RWD) is a powerful approach that can help us to tackle the problem. A site or hybrid... [More]

This blog post is contributed by Hisham Abdel-Hafez, an Expert IT Specialist in IBM Egypt and IBM Redbooks thought leader.
Update : As expected, IBM has released a new certification exam for Worklight 6.0 that can be found here . The existing exam for IBM Worklight 5.0.0.3 will be sunset by the end of November 2013. IBM is also planning a new certification exam for Worklight administration that will be released soon.
I recently became an IBM Certified Mobile Application Developer by passing the... [More]

This blog post is contributed by Virginijus Kaminas, a software engineer for a newly formed Mobile Center of Competency team for Industry Solutions. He has been a part of the Extreme Blue program and helped to develop Android/iOS applications which optimize Portal/WCM content consumption on tablet devices.
The world has embraced mobile technology with open arms, but we are still wary of the challenges that are hidden inside. Security is one of the most talked about topics in software development, and developers are now... [More]

This blog post is contributed by Steeve Chwojko, a WebSphere Education Courseware Developer and instructor with IBM.
There’s a lot of confusion over the difference between a Worklight application and a Worklight adapter. Do they work together? Can they work separately? This blog post explains the differences and the similarities.
Apply yourself!
Worklight applications live on a mobile device. They can be web applications, built out of standard web languages such as HTML5, CSS3 and JavaScript, or native... [More]

This blog post is contributed by John Reddin, Staff Software Engineer and part of the Mobile Center of Competency for Industry Solutions .
There are now over one billion smartphones in use across the globe. This figure is expected to double by 2015. Tablet sales are also exploding. The software landscape is changing, so shouldn't our design strategy change too? Modern users expect their services and information to travel with them and in a form that scales appropriately to their platform of choice.
While desktop and web... [More]

This blog post is contributed by Gregg Smith, a member of the IBM Global Technology Services Workplace Architecture team within the IBM Mobility Center of Competency. If your organization finds itself stuck with an enterprise mobility strategy that hasn’t kept up with the times or doesn’t embrace the idea of Bring Your Own Device ( BYOD ) ,
all is not lost. With just a few steps, your organization can align
their strategy against the ever-changing mobility needs of the modern
enterprise.
Step 1: Document your current environment... [More]

This blog post is contributed by David Marshak, who focuses on IBM's MobileFirst Platform, Bluemix Mobile Services, and strategic partnerships in the mobile space.
I am confident that 2015 will be dubbed the year of the wearable. The introduction of the Apple Watch will validate the ever-growing number of devices and use cases that we currently see on the wrists, lapels and even faces of early adopters. Wearables are the first real wave of the Internet of Things (IoT) , where virtually everything will have a... [More]

This blog post is contributed by Bruce Armstrong, an IBM Portfolio Manager in Software Group for Application Infrastructure Middleware working on all aspects of mobile and System z.
For those of you looking for a screaming server-side JavaScript environment, your search is over. IBM recently made available IBM SDK for Node.js Version 1.1 * for Linux on System z. It is ideal for high-performance JavaScript server applications or to consolidate many server applications to one system to save time and money.
So... [More]

This blog post is contributed by Moya Brannan, a Software Architect in the Financial Services Sector.
So here it is: Apple Pay ! Launched in October 2014, Apple Pay looks like a grown up and full-fledged payment app that will let you shop till you drop. You can use it for shopping or to buy your morning coffee; so long as there is a near field communication (NFC) reader, you’re good to go with the Apple Pay app and your fingerprint. You can also use Apple Pay when purchasing items from other apps on your iPhone or Apple... [More]

Nope. No way.
But for an old guy like me who actually went through the Y2K "fun", I have to wonder if we're getting any closer to the tipping point of developers leveraging professional testers instead of the "continuous dev/test/deliver heroism" when our platform code changes? While there are good articles on making it "easy" to migrate to iOS 8 (and probably tons more on all the variants of Android), it just begs the question, who is testing all of that mobile app... [More]

This blog post is contributed by Manny Santana, a Software Group Client Technical Professional specializing in Endpoint and Mobility in IBM Australia.
With the announcement of iOS 8 back in June 2014 and its impending release later this year, let’s take a step back and review the recent mobile device management (MDM) deployment capabilities introduced in the iOS 7.1 update released last March. The following are the major enhancements that were introduced and made available in IBM MaaS360 , our enterprise mobility... [More]

This blog post is contributed by Serkan Ersanlı who has been working as an IT Architect in IBM GBS and handles Regional Mobile and Social Solutions Focal Point in the MEA Region.
Consumer touchpoints have never been more varied than they are today. Mobile is now one of the most critical touchpoints, and mobile enterprises cannot ignore the importance of customer experience management (CEM).
In this blog post, I will share high-level information about the IBM Tealeaf CX platform and then go into more detail about... [More]

This blog post is contributed by Nathan Hazout, a developer for the web and for mobile who does customer oriented R&D for IBM Worklight.
In April, I wrote a post named "Prevent malware-ridden devices from accessing IBM Worklight adapters" that discussed integration techniques between Trusteer and IBM Worklight 6.1.
Trusteer, an IBM company, provides the Trusteer Mobile SDK , which collects multiple mobile device risk factors and provides them to the mobile app, enabling organizations to restrict mobile app... [More]

This blog post is contributed by Patrick Fan, a client-facing IT Architect and AIS Mobility Competency Leader in IBM Hong Kong GBS .
If you are keeping your eyes on social, mobile, analytics and cloud (sometimes referred to as SMAC) technologies, one of the most popular subjects in this community must be IBM Bluemix . What is IBM Bluemix? Here is the official description of IBM Bluemix from the webpage:
IBM Bluemix is an open-standards, cloud-based platform for building, managing and running apps and services of all types... [More]

This blog post is contributed by Nathan Hazout, a developer for the web and for mobile who does customer oriented R&D for IBM Worklight.
IBM Worklight allows you to develop mobile applications using native code or JavaScript code (or both).
Choosing to develop your mobile application using web technologies allows you to quickly deliver a multiplatform application without investing too much time and resources in learning to develop for each platform. However, you lose some of the built-in debugging features that each of... [More]